Cursum perficio
by Morgane
Summary: „We were bounded to each other through no will of our own, bounded with ties stronger than blood, stronger than law, stronger even than love and we both know that.“ In the hour of his death, Voldemort and The-Boy-Who-Lived share a moment of understand


**Cursum perficio**

TITLE: Cursum Perficio (That´s Latin -great surprise there- and means something along the lines of "I´ve arrived at the end of the road.") 

AUTHOR: Morgane

EMAIL: salzkartoeffelchen@web.de

DISCLAIMER: Harry Potter doesn't belong to me, but to You-Know-Who. No, not him. Her. 

This fic is inspired by "Let me talk to you", a beautiful drabble of Telanu (who one of the best Harry Potter fanfiction author's out there! Read her Tea series, it´s absolutely magnificient!) and contains some of its best lines (like for example "Nothing is worth fighting for"). Please notice that this isn´t meant as an attempt to steal her work!!!

IMPORTANT: I am no native speaker. Everybody who finds some mistakes, is free to keep them =^_^=

SUMMARY: „We were bounded to each other through no will of our own, bounded with ties stronger than blood, stronger than law, stronger even than love and we both know that." In the hour of his death, Voldemort and The-Boy-Who-Lived share a moment of understanding.

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Baby, I've been here before

I know this room, I've walked this floor

I used to live alone before I knew you

I've seen your flag on the marble arch

Love is not a victory march

It's a cold and it's a broken Hallelujah

~ Rufus Wainwright/ "Halelujah"

I remember the pain that is invading me like a cancer right now, remember the flash of green light thrown again me and the jewelled eyes, buring brightly in the colour of the course, that stare down at me now with disbelieving horror. Seventeen years have passed since that fateful night at Godric´s Hollow, and once again this boy´s strange, unexplainable power has left me crumbled, exposed and huddling feebly on the floor to his feets. Once again, Harry Potter is the Boy-Who-Lived. 

"You didn´t fight your best," he finally speaks into the painful silence, his voice revealing nothing of the thriumph I have expected, just wariness and slight resignation. The remarkable green eyes are still unfocussed, but realisation of what he has just done and where it has got him, gradually begins to dawn in them. "Why? Why did you let me win?"

_Because nothing is worth fighting for. _

But I don´t tell him that. He will find out soon enough for himself. 

Gathering the rest of my strenght to look up to the face I knew so well, this face that haunted my every dream ever since the very first moment our roads met, I surprise myself with comprehending exactly what he feels right now; the memory of my first killing, though a lifetime ago, is still too clearly imprinted in my mind not to understand the look of utmost despair on the boy´s delicate features. 

Seventeen years ago, I have made you an orphan, Harry Potter.

Today, your precious Dumbedore has made you a murderer.

Just tell me who had shown more mercy on you?

When he realizes that I won´t answer his question, he sighs softly, his eyes still laying on me. Strange as it is, this boy is the only one who ever looked with sincere emotional intent on me, the only one who ever saw through my masks to the human I am beneath all the blood and death and destruction. Shortly I allow myself a moment of revery. We could have done great things together, the two of us, we could have loved another like no one else would have been capable of.

I only realize that I have spoken the words aloud when he nods in defeat and sits down cross-legged besides me. To my surprise his expression mirrors my own. "I know", he whispers, his brilliant, impossible green eyes infused with a soft light but never breaking contact with mine. "I´ve always known this."

My eyes widen in surprise, before a bitter little smile appears on my lips. 

Too late.

I am dying. 

It´s irritating, all this terribly confusion you seem bound to get when you decide to muck about with eternal life, but although I haven´t fallen into the reaper´s hands directly when the Killing Curse hit me, although I am still breathing, it is clear to both of us that it will soon be over. It is only a matter of time before the fallout and with my death he will lose the closest companion of his life. 

For just this moment, we can both regret this.

My eyes flash to the lightning scar marring his pale forehead and linger there for a moment. We were bounded to each other through no will of our own that strange, starless night so many years ago when I failed the Curse that left him with this mark, bounded with ties stronger than blood, stronger than law, stronger even than love and we both know that. _Even my death will never truly free you of me, Harry Potter. I will reside in you until the day you die._ A sardonic smirk appears on my face despite myself. _Immortality at last._

It is only now that I notice his arms around me; shortly I wonder how I´ve ended in this embrace, this embrace that seems so right and wrong at the same time for many, many reasons, before I allow myself to relax in its warmth. So strange to think that this boy, this *boy*, who had been my downfall not once but twice,...this boy is keeping me from feeling the dreadful coldness I suffered a lifetime long. 

"Listen, Harry," I suddenly hear myself telling him, "There are things in The Riddle House, things I want you to have. Books, potions... they will help you to understand our world and yourself so much better. Don´t let your ridiculoulsy moral friends destroy them. They will help you on your way."

For one moment his eyes widen and I see the need in them, the need and the painful thirst for knowledge and the power it promises. Then he shakes his head, tangled stands of untidy black hair falling across his face. "I can't take them," he replies softly as though scared to hurt my feelings with his words. "I can't afford to become more like you than I already am. I´m sorry." 

This causes me a mirthless smile. Oh, Harry, don´t you realize that it is too late for this sort of worry? Haven´t you felt the fallout when you´ve spoken the Forbidden Curse just minutes ago? Avada Kedavra, it requires more than just the words, magical blood and a wand. It requires focussed hatred, a slight opening of the door to the darkness in your heart and the willing sacrifice of a tiny fragment of your soul every time it's used, successful or not. 

You are lost already.

For a moment I allow myself to marvel at Dumbledore's utter blindness - did this Great Champion of Light and his ridiculous Order actually think that, unlike us Slytherins, this child would rise from the ashes as a phoenix instead of a demon if they threw him mercilessly into this war? Well, they would pay the price for this miscalculation soon enough. They may have caused the downfall of one Dark Lord tonight, but another will rise in my place.

The thought is almost enough to make me smile when I look up to the boy, who still holds me warm against the cold around us, again. Yes, Harry is too much like me, too much like any Slytherin I´ve ever known to be satisfied with the common life they have in store for him. There might have been enough of James Potter´s stubborn courage in him to fool the Sorting Head, but definetely not enough to fool Lord Voldemort. Right from the beginning on, when I met the wide-eyed little First Year after ten years of seperation, I have felt an urge for knowledge in him, a hunger to win out against all odds with as low a price as possible that glows in the depths of his eyes even now. I smile faintly; yes, undubitable a Slytherin behind this flaming red he´s wearing.

And perhaps he knows this in his hearts of hearts, perhaps he understands that he has crossed boundaries tonight that he won´t be able to re-go, for a wary smile, a smile that has nothing to do with the vivid, youthful boy the world knows, appears shortly on his features. 

"Funny, isn´t it?" he murmurs softly. "I only seem to end up regretting things that I wasn't given a choice about in the first place."

A little smirk appears on my dying features. "Do you want to say that you regret killing me?" I taunt him. "I am shocked, Mr Potter, just think what your fans will say!"

But he doesn´t react to the mockery. Instead he even smiles. "It´s strange. You formed me. You made me what I am today." Wariness strives his features once again. "In a way, you´ve been the closest thing I ever had for a father."

_And you are the closest thing I ever had for a son._

Again it takes me a moment to realise that I have spoken the words aloud.

Feeling his tears landing on my skin where his cheek is pressed against mine, I shortly wonder what he is crying for; is he merely relieved that this useless war is finally over or is his sorrow of another nature? Does he weep for the friends the constant fighting has taken from him? For his lost innocence, perhaps? Or is one of these tears perhaps even shed for me and the thing we could have had if fate had meant if differently with us?

His eyes widen as I unexpectedly smile up at him and almost instinctively his arms tighten around me, keeping me from the freezing cold around us. 

_Perhaps,_ it crosses my mind, _if I hadn´t killed your parents...if you hadn´t been so stubbornly proud, perhaps..., but then again..._

"Better this way," I hear myself whisper. 

He shakes his head violently, unable to respond. Reaching up one trembling hand, I finally give in to my long hidden desire and brush his cheek tenderly like I would have brushed the cheek of a brother or a son. He was both to me, I hope he knows that. "Don't cry", I tell him in a whisper. "Don´t cry, Harry."

He catches up my hand in his and helds it against his chin, still shaking

his head slightly in denial, but the tears stop flowing.

Good.

It grows ever more difficult to focus on him with every second for I am growing less and less attached to my body, but nevertheless I force every fibre of my body to be attuned to the boy who holds me so gently as if we hadn´t been enemies, as if he hadn´t killed me just now. For one instant my gaze lingers on the scar on his forehead marring his delicate features, that scar that had flown out of my own wand what seems a lifetime ago. _How much easier would my life have been if you had died this night...how much easier for both of us! But somehow I find myself unable to regret that I´ve seen the man you have grown to..._

Still smiling, I look up past the beautiful boy's face at the sky and realize a haze of white snowflakes drifting downward like white butterflies dancing, like memories. Far too many memories, but none of them matters now. The only thing that matters is that Harry is still holding me.

_I wish...that I could be snow, falling towards you..._

It is getting harder to breathe, but I am still warm, still smiling in silent wonder and in the comforting knowledge of his presence, I can finally give up my lifelong fight against the reaper, I finally let him close my eyes, knowing that the Boy-Who-Lived will do so not only for him, but also for me. He will continue what I have begun.

_Farewell, Harry Potter._

_I´ve arrived at the end of my road._

FINIS


End file.
